Chapter 20
20
I nara
As soon as I arrive at Club Empire, an attendant offers to take my coat. I gave in and wore the coat Rex gifted me. It’s long and warm. I decline to take it off, wanting the extra layer of armor.
“This way.” The attendant guides me to the top floor, to a private club area available only to platinum members. “I’ll let Mr. St. James know you’re here.”
The bar is empty except for a couple murmuring to each other in a far booth. I walk forward into a cloud of woodsy cologne. It smells like Rex in here. Maybe that’s just a scent they pump through the vents.
Or maybe it’s because he’s here frequently. He is part owner, after all.
Has he been here recently? Has he been scening with another submissive?
Jealousy hits me like razor blades in my bloodstream, shocking and painful. I’ve been assuming I’m the only one he’s scening with, but he is a member of a sex club, and we’re not in a relationship.
I assumed I was the only one he was stalking, too, but he has more than enough resources to surveil a small country. I could be one of many.
The thought makes me dig my nails into my palms. But I won’t get mad. I’ll get even.
I ease onto a barstool and tug down my hip-hugging leather skirt. “I’d like a glass of merlot,” I tell the bartender.
“Certainly.” She bobs her head, giving me a view of the snake tattoos winding around a bright red mohawk.
I have a thought and lean over the bar. “Wait. Can I put the purchase on my membership tab?”
The bartender looks surprised but covers it. “Of course. We don’t accept any other form of payment.”
“In that case, I’d like a glass of whiskey. Top shelf.”
She grins. “I have a twenty-four-year-old scotch, aged in white oak. Goes for about nine hundred dollars a bottle.”
“Perfect.” Rex can afford it.
I settle in with my drink to wait.
* * *
Rex
Ivan drops me off at Empire, and I head straight for the upper rooms that hold the offices. “Where’s St. James?” I ask Henri.
“Downstairs. In a private room.”
I don’t have to ask which one. I know exactly what St. James is up to.
He’s in my favorite play room, the one I’ve used with Inara.
I burst in, breathing like a racehorse. St. James is standing with his back to the door. The room is empty of anyone but him. She’s not here. Yet.
St. James barely turns his head to acknowledge me. Typical power play. He’s got a drink in his hand, and he takes a sip. He knows I’m angry, and he’s showing he’s unconcerned.
I don’t greet him. I act as if he’s not here and walk over to the liquor cabinet. The bastard has helped himself to my whiskey, draining one of the bottles to the dregs.
I study the label. “This single malt has been in the Roy cellars for over twenty years, and you guzzled it like soda.”
“I had to mix it with soda, actually, to get it down.”
I set down the bottle with a thunk. “I’ve killed for less.”
“Is that why you rushed in here? To make sure I’m drinking your liquor properly?”
Even his voice grates on me. He grew up on the streets, but now he sounds like a cultured snob. Overcompensating. I avoid making fun of his origins. He can hold back his reactions about most things, but if someone trips his trigger, it’s like a nuclear bomb.
“You can’t amuse yourself, playing with what’s mine.”
“Relax, Roy.” He finally faces me. The gods took their time when they made him. His face and frame are perfectly sculpted, but there’s something cold and reptilian about his colorless eyes. People are drawn to him, drawn to his beauty and wealth, until they get close. Then they scurry away, avoiding him as if they can tell he’s missing a soul. “I was never going to scene with her.”
“And yet you’re here.”
“In my own club? You’re not the sole owner, remember.”
I hold my temper. My father and Hamish taught me this, how to act calm when rage claws my chest like a rabid dog. “We’ve always been careful not to trespass on each other’s territory.”
“We’re more powerful when we work together for our mutual benefit. But it’s come to my attention that you might no longer be committed to the best interests of our businesses.”
“I’ve always held up my side of any bargain.” I narrow my eyes, but I know I don’t have to remind him of how I seeded his first investments. He came to me, young and hungry, with an eye for opportunity.
Some part of me knew he’d never be a friend, knew he might turn on me at any time. His loyalty has always lain elsewhere. I was a means to an end in his eyes. And now that he’s built his fortune and position to equal mine, he might feel like he has no use for me.
“Let’s speak plainly. You made a move on my submissive.”
“I told you I wasn’t going through with it. I could, but I won’t. But it’s interesting that you call her yours.”
“She is. Mine.”
“Does she know that?”
“She will. I’ll make it clear to her. First, I’m going to deal with you.”
“Oh? How are you going to deal with me? Put on your body armor and hunt me the way you do petty criminals in dark alleyways?”
Only St. James would risk baiting me like this. I control my expression, but my lack of reaction is a reaction, and he reads it like front-page news.
“Yes, Roy, I know how you get your jollies. Hunting humans. The streets were my home first, remember?”
And now he’s bringing up his past before I can needle him with it. Exploding my ammunition before I can use it. Typical tricks.
“What is your intention toward Inara?”
“Inara. . .” He draws out each syllable, and I want to punch him for daring to hold her name in his mouth. “She’s lovely. Not my type. I prefer them more. . . compliant.”
I want to shut him up, but I don’t trust myself to move or speak. I’m close to strangling him with my bare hands. I’ve had plenty of practice choking a man to death and quite enjoy it. Such a thrill to be face to face with a victim as the light leaves their eyes.
“She was intrigued enough to come here to speak to me, but it wouldn’t have gone any further. She won’t admit it, but she’s as enamored with you as you are of her.”
This is why St. James is dangerous. He understands people with one look, one glance. He honed this gift early when he had to live by his wits as a street urchin and every hour was a fight for survival.
In one sentence, he tells me exactly what I want to hear, calming my fear and taming the beast. “You think she’s enamored with me?” I keep my voice level, hiding the hope.
St. James hears it all the same. His lips quirk in the closest thing he has to a smile.
“She’s in denial about it. She hasn’t chosen you yet.”
“She will.”
St. James makes a non-committal noise.
The tension in the room unravels.
“You don’t want her,” I say.
He shakes his head. “I want to know why you do.”
I’ve killed with my bare hands. I’ve also used razor wire, and at this moment, I know what it would feel like to have a metal noose tighten around my throat. St. James set this trap for me. But any secrets I allow out into the world can be used against me, and, knowing St. James, he won’t hesitate to use anything at his disposal to destroy me.
And while I’d sacrifice myself for Inara with no hesitation, anything St. James knows about us puts her at risk, too.
But I have to tell him something. And he’ll know if it isn’t the truth.
I weigh the consequences for another second. “She’s. . . like me.” My throat is tight.
He blinks slowly, a sign of shock. He didn’t expect me to lay myself bare. But I’m a man obsessed. What do I have to lose?
“Do you know her safe word?” I ask. I’m about topull out my phone and show him, but he’s read her file and obviously memorized it.
“Eliyra,” he says. “It’s the name of the town where she was born and raised.”
“Where her family was murdered.”
He inclines his head.
I put away my phone. “I know what it’s like to go through what she went through. I understand the depth of her loss, and she understands mine.” This is the truth, but it’s no secret. I keep going, sharing more than is comfortable. “She keeps her pain around her like a monk’s hair shirt. I want her to let me be the one who tortures her instead.”
St. James is perfectly still, listening. I’m appealing to him, one dom to another, and I know he understands. There’s a reason he has a stake in a BDSM sex club. His kink is similar, if not darker, than mine.
“I will give her the pain she craves, good pain. And help her to bear it.” Here in the room where Inara and I first met face to face, it’s easy to channel the emotion into my voice. “She was made for me. And everything I’ve done, everything I’ve become. . . I know now it’s because I was made for her.”
That’s it. I’ve bared my jugular. I’ve shown him everything.
I stop speaking, waiting to see if it’s enough.
Maybe this isn’t all about me. St. James enjoys power of all types. In his head, he might have appointed himself Inara’s guardian to require me to pay a bride price.
I’ll pay it, though, gladly. And if he’s a threat to her, I’ll snap his neck, business be damned. He has his wits, but I’ve trained like a warrior. It’d be a fair fight, but I would win in the end.
I have someone to live for.
I steel myself for a fight, but St. James moves first. He drains his drink and sets it down.
It’s over.
“Congratulations, then. On finding her.”
I freeze, wondering if he’s referencing how long I’ve been searching for her. The only one who knows that is Hamish. His expression gives nothing away, so I respond to the surface statement. “Thank you.”
“I’ll leave you to it. She’s in the private bar. Running up a tab on your credit, I believe.” His smile deepens. It makes him look like a snake. “I’ll have them send her down.”
“I’d appreciate that.”
He pauses at the door, studying the wall of implements at my disposal. He’s thinking of all his preferred ways of meting out punishment. “Enjoy.”
I wait until he shuts the door to sink into the couch. I meant what I said. I’d have said it sooner, except Inara is looking for any excuse to run from me. I’ll wait until I have her tied down. Literally, if need be. We’ve already established that she likes rope.
I rise and head over to the available tools. I don’t have much time. I need to make my plans and prepare for tonight’s scene.
I have a little bird who needs to be taught a lesson.